Intel's CEO was once targeted by Trump over ties to China — now its stock has hit record highs. How he pulled it off

It was August 7, 2025 erstwhile Donald Trump took to Truth Social to blast Intel and its CEO.

"The CEO of INTEL is highly CONFLICTED and indispensable resign, immediately," helium wrote. (1) "There is nary different solution to this problem. Thank you for your attraction to this problem!"

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The company's stock, astatine the time, was trading for astir $20. (2) Today, shares are much than quadruple that, hitting grounds highs past week. (3) Last Friday, the company's banal had its champion time since 1987, climbing 24%. (4)

It's the firm comeback of the year.

Analysts are coming astir to the company, and CEO Lip-Bu Tan is being heralded arsenic a leader successful tech spaces. (5)

Here's however helium did it.

Rejecting the premise

Many investors had written Intel disconnected arsenic outdated erstwhile Tan came connected board. Nvidia had pushed its mode to the spot marketplace arsenic the AI gyration got underway.

Still, immoderate shareholders welcomed his arrival.

Shares jumped 10% connected the quality that Tan was taking the apical office. He was seen arsenic eminently qualified and was the archetypal outsider to ever beryllium named a person astatine the company.

Sen. Tom Cotton (R-Ark.), however, questioned Tan's ties to Chinese companies and raised concerns astir a transgression lawsuit astatine Cadence Design, wherever Tan served arsenic CEO until 2021. That got Trump progressive and things began to determination fast.

Tan's archetypal measurement was to reverse Trump's thinking, thing helium handled rapidly by a gathering successful Washington. Ultimately, helium ended up convincing Trump to person the authorities bargain a 10% involvement successful the company.

That currency infusion was the opening of a bid of events that repositioned Intel.

The company's processors are present successful request erstwhile again (and Intel says it volition enactment with Elon Musk's and SpaceX's forthcoming Terafab project). (6) And net are up, owed to that demand, with revenues climbing 7% implicit a twelvemonth agone successful its astir caller report. (7)

"We are embracing our roots arsenic information driven, paranoid, and engineering driven," Tan said connected the company's Q1 net league call, referencing Intel cofounder Andy Grove's celebrated "only the paranoid survive" philosophy.

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Securing further investors

The authorities isn't the lone entity investing successful Intel these days. Last September, Nvidia made a $5 cardinal concern successful the company, with Intel agreeing to fabricate not lone AI chips, but Nvidia's RTX GPU. (8)